Can't decide on a research interest for Clinical PhD program

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SnowBubble

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Hi guys, I'm new to SDN and I was hoping you could help me figure out my research interest for grad school. I've read other threads about this but they didn't seem to apply to me/they were outdated by more than a year :) So here goes...!

I'm currently confused about my research interest because up until a few days ago, I was absolutely sure I wanted to do research on severe mental illnesses in grad school. But after completing an undergrad thesis on a pretty intense topic and interning at a home for people with severe mental illness for 6 months, I feel really burnt out!! I think continuing with research on difficult topics or on severe mental illnesses might further burn me out or make grad school life really emotionally draining.

So I think I should switch to a less intense research area...but I'm not sure what that means or how to approach searching for a new interest. I know that I definitely want a PhD in Clinical Psych but beyond that I'm now at a loss. Does anyone have any suggestions? Or do you think I should stick with research on/working with intense populations and that over time it won't be as tiring? I feel like anything else may not be as interesting to me; but now I also feel like severe mental illnesses are also no longer my cup of tea.

All of this is especially problematic because I am planning to apply this fall (for 2011 school year). Even though it might be beneficial to take a year off that is not an option in my situation because of various reasons. If anyone has any thoughts or advice on what to do, please let me know!​

Oh also I am hoping for my research interest to coincide with a clinical population I could also do therapy with. This is why finding a research interest is becoming so difficult. I would like to focus on being a practitioner in the future, but also simultaneously do research and publish throughout. I would say both are equally important now, but that maybe 30 years from now I'd like to focus more on therapy.

Thank you so much! :)

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I'm not really sure what the questions is, but sufice to say that many struggle with finding a niche that they are truely passionate about. Some never do, including myself. I came in hardcore npsych, but fell out of it due to assessment burn-out and a lack of economic payoff for the time (and hoops) involved. I'm staunchly scientific, but not on a tenure-track path.... I find human dynmaics, communication, and behavior interesting, but I am not a very touchy-feely therapist type either. We'll see what I end up doing after this predoc internship year...lol

Maybe it would help to think about it less as "a single-topic research interest" and more as "an area that I simply want to learn more about."
 
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Only you can determine what will be interesting to you. I think one key here is whether you are burned out on "severe mental illness" or just the specific project, as those are two dramatically different things.

If you are totally unable to take time off...this is going to place you in a very difficult situation as you do not want to end up unable to finish because you weren't certain before going in. Sometimes it is possible to switch topics/advisors as a grad student, but not always. I guess the best recommendation I have is to just start reading articles again (that is what always does it for me). Find interesting stuff and read it. Then find some interesting references in that article and read those. Repeat.

If after a few rounds, you are still in the same area..that is probably a good sign. If you have shifted to something totally different, its time to take a second look at things. I imagine getting through graduate school in an area you aren't truly interested in would be absolutely miserable.

That said, don't feel like you need to find too specific a niche. I picked my advisor specifically because of a broad focus. We study genetics, alcohol, tobacco, neuroscience, emotion, exercise, psychophysiology, pharmacology, and more. I like it all so I wanted someplace where I wouldn't have to decide. You may want to find someone with some breadth to their research so that you have a bit more flexibility in your research than working with someone who say, has spent their entire life developing this one assessment for a very specific population in a very specific situation.
 
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If you've just a finished an intense project or experience in an area that has appealed to you for a while, it might be a normal reaction to finishing a project and having the chance to breathe. I know that I have definitely felt that way about my work at times, even though I've been working in the same general area for six years now and it's truly a passion. At the same time, that feeling of burnout might mean that serious psychopathology isn't the best field for you long-term. See how you feel in a week or a month.

When I left my last practicum site, I was so burnt-out, you could see the grill marks on me. I swore that I'd never work in that particular type of setting again. A week later, I realized how toxic my direct supervisor had been and how much I missed that setting! I knew that while I was there, but it was easy to conflate the two when I was trying to hang onto my own sanity.

PS: Still don't miss that supervisor at all!
 
Hi guys, thanks for your feedback! what you said is really helpful :)

i think my feeling of burn out is from a combination of what you guys said. i think i feel burned out from my particular thesis project but also because my supervisor at my practicum site (for people with severe mental illnesses) really did not provide me with any instruction/guidance on how to deal with leaving the workplace atmosphere at work.

i think applying to a faculty advisor who is researching a broad range of topics is a great idea! i figured most researchers were very specialized. thanks!

i think that feeling of burnout indicates that i cannot continue research on my thesis, but that maybe similar topics that are less intense might still be interesting to me. also, i've been thinking that maybe a lot of working with mental illnesses at my practicum was management of mental illness and i don't think im as interested in that. i think maybe working with severe pathology that can be alleviated might be more interesting... maybe like severe generalized anxiety disorder? im not sure if this line of logic makes sense... but i do feel better because it seems i don't need to know EXACTLY what i want to do before applying to grad school. thinking about it like "what do i want to learn more about" is a great approach and i think that will be really helpful!

thanks again guys! good luck figuring out your pre-doc internship! and i hope your next practicum site supervisor isn't too toxic!
 
Also remember that you can still work with "intense" populations, but using methodologies that aren't as emotionally demanding (for you). For example, a one-time experimental protocol with people who have SMI is going to be less draining than a 6 month psychotherapy study with the same population.

And while it's nice to have "practice inform research," it doesn't have to be an absolute. For example, my research is in the area of mood disorders, but I find that I enjoy the treatment of anxiety disorders more. Of course there is substantial overlap between the two, but it's also nice to take a "break" from severe depression every once in a while, and do some panic control treatment! ;)
 
And know that any project you decide on is going to possibly burn you out just due to the nature of the dissertation beast.
 
Thanks guys that makes a lot of sense! I guess I was so worried about figuring out whether I was sick of my project topic or topic area that I guess I didn't even consider that I might just be drained from working on A project for so long!

I guess I still enjoy that area, and maybe doing research (less interactive research) is okay for me, but maybe not working with such a population continuously.

Thank you SDNers! Your comments have been really helpful!
 
Pretty much any successful academic will have some sort of "unifying theme" to their work. Occasionally you see these folks who claim to be "experts" in "Eating disorders, depression, anxiety, and susbtance use". I've only met a few but I'm guessing that is generally a lie, and they know comparatively little about all of them relative to the true experts. The key behind labs with breadth is generally collaboration, and there is a big difference between being "comfortable" with a topic enough to do a research project and claiming expertise. There's just too much volume to the literature these days...maybe 50 years ago it was possible, but not now.

For us our unifying theme is generally tobacco use. That said, if I had a good rationale to run a study looking at genetic moderation of emotional reactivity among the general population...I'm not convinced that would be shot down outright. We have access to collaborators and the necessary equipment to do such research well, even if it is a bit deviant from the current program of research.

I hope that was clear. Basically it boils down to the fact that yes, most people are specialized and yes, you need to find a good fit with someone who does work that you like. That said, there are people who are VERY VERY narrow and there are people doing work that requires the involvement of multiple disciplines. The latter probably offers more freedom in terms of topics and experience. That said, it is probably also more common to find the latter at the research-heavy universities, which is probably not what you are looking for so finding them may prove challenging.
 
Thanks Ollie123! Well at least I know that what I'm looking for is an option available somewhere. Hopefully I'll find something :) If not, I might apply to a mixture of broad topic research oriented schools and research-focused equal emphasis schools.
 
Pretty much any successful academic will have some sort of "unifying theme" to their work. Occasionally you see these folks who claim to be "experts" in "Eating disorders, depression, anxiety, and susbtance use". I've only met a few but I'm guessing that is generally a lie, and they know comparatively little about all of them relative to the true experts.

A thought that came from your post was a series of articles that came out following Paul Meehl's death in 2003.

One of the articles discussed the idea of whether Meehl could have been a tenured professor at any large state university (much less a research bastion like Minnesota) in todays modern academic culture (just a reminder that Meehl joined Minnesota's faculty in 1945 and was tenured by 1953). Although productive, his lack of pursuing external grant funding, broad, Renaissance-man scholarship, and his enormous amount of nonempirical "think pieces" probably would have made this an impossibility for him. Kinda a shame....and strange to think about actually.
 
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